The University of Arkansas released a study Feb. 12 that found 28.8% of Arkansans face food insecurity.
Michael Niño, a professor at the University of Arkansas, is the principal investigator for the Arkansas Health Survey.
“What we’re learning is that Arkansans really care not only [about] their health, but the health of their neighbors, the people they love and their community members. [And] we want to try to find ways to help,” Niño said.
According to Niño, the survey requires effort and time to be done because the research team didn’t use data from any previous studies.
“We started collecting survey responses in late 2024 and finished in July 2025,” he said.
“The data that we collected is completely original,” Niño said. “We sent out 70,000 invitations to adult Arkansans throughout the state up to four times, through a mailed invitation. It collected 9,932 complete original responses.”
There are differences between rural and urban areas in the serious level of food insecurity surrounding Arkansas.
“Up in Northwest Arkansas, we have high pockets of food insecurity in urban areas. When you look throughout the Delta region, the 15 full counties along the Mississippi, you see high concentrations of food insecurity in rural areas as well,” Niño said.
“Depending on where you live and depending on the type of outcome we’re looking at, you will see substantial variation across places,” he said.
The main strategy and criteria the research team used followed national standards.
“When we assess food insecurity, what we do is we’re looking at six different questions that assess access to food over the last 12 months. The six items were drawn from the USDA [United States Department of Agriculture] short-form module on food insecurity. It is an instrument that has been used for over 30 years to assess food insecurity across the country.”
The lack of information about food insecurity was a challenge, as well as the target for the team.
“Prior to the survey, we really didn’t have a robust public health data infrastructure that would enable us to understand where health disparities and various social determinants of health were highly concentrated in the state, and ways to potentially address them,” Niño said.
“I think what our data show is that disparities in health and social determinants of health, like food insecurity, are not uniformly distributed across the state.”
This annual report is Niño’s first time leading a food insecurity survey.
“I’m the principal investigator on the survey. Ben Amick is an associate researcher at the College of Public Health at UAMS. He’s a co-principal investigator. There’s [also] a large group of secondary researchers from UAMS, UA Fayetteville in the Clinton School that are also on the team. To date, over 12 students from the U of A have worked on the project,” Niño said.
“We have completed data collection for year one,” he said. “The plan is to start working on year two of the survey this summer.”
Understanding residents’ concerns, Niño said that the reason behind this survey is more than conducting academic research.
“I think an important note is that, moving forward, the USDA will no longer administer their survey. Because we have the Arkansas Health Survey, we will continue to provide meaningful information on food insecurity across the state.”
